Bassoonist Eyal Streett grew up in Jerusalem. As a boy he attended the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra’s concerts for children. At one of those concerts his attention was drawn to a contrabassoon. At the following concert, he plucked up courage and approached the bassoonist, Richard Paley, to ask what this instrument was. Today, at age 30, Streett lives in Spain and performs with some of the finest Baroque ensembles in Europe as well as with his own trio, “Rubato Appassionato”.
Pamela: Eyal, when did you begin taking music lessons?
Eyal: As a child, I learned the recorder with Etti Schwarz. I was accepted to the Jerusalem Academy High School for junior high and chose bassoon as my instrument, studying with Richard Paley. I continued recorder studies with Sarig Sella till age 14. I played the bassoon in the school orchestra and also joined the Hebrew University Orchestra, which was and is till today, conducted by Anita Kamien. It was an amateur orchestra, but there I became familiar with much orchestral repertoire. I also played in an orchestra conducted by Yevgeny Tzirlin and Ronny Porat, traveling overseas to perform. I was fortunate in attending the Interlochen Summer Arts Camp, where we performed together with some of the world’s greatest soloists, among them, YoYo Ma.
After my army service, I spent a year studying bassoon with Mordechai Rechtman, at the same time, playing in the Israel Chamber Orchestra. Rechtman, bassoonist in the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, was a very demanding teacher; he taught me much about standards of excellence and about how to listen to one’s own playing.
Pamela: What inspired your interest in Baroque music?
Eyal: It was in our teens that a friend of mine played a Baroque recorder; I asked Richard Paley about playing an “authentic” bassoon. He lent me an instrument and I got the feel of it. At age 17, I traveled to Holland to purchase a Baroque bassoon from a very fine instrument builder.
I began attending the Jerusalem Early Music Workshop, where I made contacts with Baroque players and I made a point of going to concerts in the “Authentic Music” series in Jerusalem.
Pamela: Where did you continue your studies?
Eyal: Accepted at schools both in the Hague and in Milan, I was faced with the dilemma of which to choose. I chose to study at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague, studying with the well-known American bassoonist Donna Agrell. Agrell invested a lot of energy in each of her students, appreciating the individual musical personality of each, and she was of great inspiration for me. The Royal Conservatory took a free approach to students, encouraging them to form their own ensembles. It was there that I met my wife – Spanish recorder player Antonia Tajeda. In the four years I spent there, I played much basso continuo. But it was not all early music; I developed an interest for electronic music there and took part in a contemporary ensemble. Two years into my studies in Holland, I began performing in several Baroque ensembles – under Rene Jacobs in Freiburg, in Paris and in “La Petite Bande” with Sigiswald Kujken in Belgium.
Pamela: Did you stay in Holland?
Eyal: No. We settled in Barcelona and I would travel to Milan to study with bassoonist Alberto Grazzi, spending a couple of days at a time in Milan, taking lessons with Grazzi and performing together with his other students. From Grazzi I understood the fact that a musician has the right to choose in his or her art, one of the most important lessons I have learned.
I completed my studies in 2003 and began playing with “Nachtmusique”, a woodwind ensemble directed by Eric Hoeprich, himself a performer on historical clarinets. Three or four years ago I joined Alfredo Bernadini and the Grazzi brothers in “Ensemble Zefiro”, a group based in Italy that performs a lot of wind chamber music.
In the meantime, we have moved to Seville. I have a few pupils but my time is mainly spent performing in groups around Europe Have performed in North America, and China, but most of our work is in Europe.
Pamela: Would you like to tell us about “Rubato Appassionato”?
Eyal: Yes. We are three players – my wife Antonia on Baroque recorders, Sasha Agranov on Baroque ‘cello and I play Baroque bassoon. Sasha is a friend of mine who was born in Russia and grew up in Israel. The trio began playing when we were in Holland. We had been playing in a larger ensemble but were interested to see what we could do in a group without harmonic instruments. We knew there had been ensembles such as ours in the Baroque period and the combination works well. We have played a lot of English music with grounds (bassi ostinati) but the program we have brought here is one of 18th century Spanish dance music, dances we found in old manuscripts. We create variations to them, combining our fantasy with the aesthetics of the period. Thus it is music for the concert hall and not for a royal court! We are playing three concerts on this trip to Israel. I am here also to attend a concert in memory of my sister, Tova, who died four years ago.
Pamela: What are your future plans?
Eyal: I hope to continue my work with the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra, with “Les Talens Lyriques” in Paris ( a Baroque orchestra founded in 1999 by French conductor and harpsichordist Christophe Rousset), to take part in the Salzburg Festival and more. “Rubato Appassionato” will be doing recordings and performing eight concerts in Andalusia in the coming Autumn.
Pamela: Eyal, thank you for giving us of your time. We at “Living in Harmony” wish you much joy and success in your career.
Monday, September 28, 2009
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Simon Wall - English tenor - sings oratorio and more
On July 27th 2009 I met tenor Simon Wall (b.1975) at Dartington Hall, Devon, UK, where he was teaching and performing. Wall, an “English tenor”, will be soloing in December 2009 with the Israel Camerata Jerusalem 2009 in Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, with the Clare College Choir of Cambridge, conducted by Tim Brown. Performances will be in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Haifa and Carmiel.
PH: Simon, how did you make your way into the world of music and singing?
SW: I was born in Ipswich, Suffolk. My father is a priest and, from a very young age, I went to church every Sunday. By the age of three I was joining in all the hymns with great fortitude. My parents, not being musicians, were not sure how to start by musical education. When I was seven or eight years old, they took me to King’s College, Cambridge to hear Evensong and I was completely blown away by the experience. We applied to several cathedral choir schools, but I was considered too old to join and had no background in playing musical instruments. We then went to our local cathedral at Bury St. Edmunds and the organist immediately agreed to take me in. There, I joined the cathedral choir, loving every minute of it, and went on to become head chorister.
I went to a public school in Surrey and then won a music scholarship to St. John’s School, Leatherhead, where I spent five years. My voice began to change, dropping from treble range to tenor and, fortunately, during the process, there was no time when I was not able to sing.
PH: Having finished school, what were your next moves?
SH: I spent my gap year in Portsmouth, singing in the Portsmouth Cathedral Choir. Winning a choral scholarship, I went to study at St. John’s College, Cambridge, which has a distinguished tradition of religious music. I was reading Theology and Music, studying voice with David Lowe. The St. John’s College Chapel Choir sang the daily services during term time and, at other times, we toured the world, performing. This chapel choir was among the top five choirs in Cambridge. I began singing solos with the choir and with choral societies in Cambridge.
In 1998 I began a teacher training course but, two weeks into studies, decided it was not for me. I was doing an extra year in the St. John’s College Choir. Tim Brown rescued me by employing me at Clare College as his assistant. Since then, I have remained a soloist with the Clare College Choir. Through that job, I landed another – as John Rutter’s personal assistant from 1999 to 2002. (Rutter is a fellow of Clare College and Tim Brown’s predecessor.)
However, in 2002 I applied to study at the Royal College of Music, won a scholarship and took studies there with Ashley Stafford and David Maxwell Anderson. This led me into the solo world.
PH: Would you like to talk about your solo career?
SW: Yes. My main field at the moment is oratorio, often singing the role of the Evangelist. I love singing oratorio. I have sung the Evangelist in Bach Passions, performing all over England and in New York. Most recently, I performed the St. Matthew Passion in Cambridge with Tim Brown conducting the Clare College Choir. Not long ago, I sang it at the Snape Maltings (Benjamin Britten’s concert hall in Suffolk) conducted by Masaaki Suzuki.
The oddest oratorio I have sung in is a large piece by Sir John Tavener “The Veil of the Temple”, which we performed in the Temple Church in London. The work is actually an all-night vigil. I had to sing 15 minutes of unaccompanied Gospel at 5 a.m.! “The Veil of the Temple” is a multi-faith piece in eight cycles, with a Gospel at the end of each. We also performed it in New York’s Lincoln Center and we did a shortened version of it at the Proms in London’s Albert Hall.
PH: Do you sing opera?
SH: I have done some opera work. I have sung under Emmanuelle Haim in Opera de Lille and Opera du Rhin. Haim is a French conductor and harpsichordist with a particular interest in early music. I sang in her performance of Purcell’s “Faerie Queene”. Together with ten other singers, I took part in a recording she directed – “Lamentie” - a selection of mostly Monteverdi works.
PH: What do you consider the to be the high points in your career so far?
SH: One of them was soloing in the Three Choirs Festival (UK.) This takes place every August by rotation in the cathedral cities of Gloucester, Hereford and Worcester. I sang in Schumann’s oratorio “Das Paradies und die Peri”, conducted by (the late) Richard Hickocks.
I recently sang the role of the Evangelist in a recording (Naxos) with the Choir of Jesus College, Cambridge of “The Passion of Our Lord According to Saint Mark” (1920), composed by Charles Wood.
I am a founding member of “La Nuova Musica” – a fairly new ensemble in which we are trying to bring vocal drama back to early music, based on treatises written at the time, the main one being Caccini’s “Le Nuove Musiche” (1602), a word-led approach.
PH: So what is next?
SW: I will appear in the 2009 Three Choirs Festival in a piece by John McCabe (b.1939) called “Songs of the Garden”, a selection of garden- and wildlife poetry set for choir and soloists. Then countertenor Iestyn Davies and I will perform Blow’s “Ode on the Death of Henry Purcell” at a Prom concert in September together with the Academy of Ancient Music.
And, of course, there are the Bach Christmas Oratorio concerts in Israel in December 2009. I have been in Tel Aviv on vacation, but this will be my first performing tour of Israel.
PH: Simon, many thanks for your time. We look forward to welcoming you in Israel.
PH: Simon, how did you make your way into the world of music and singing?
SW: I was born in Ipswich, Suffolk. My father is a priest and, from a very young age, I went to church every Sunday. By the age of three I was joining in all the hymns with great fortitude. My parents, not being musicians, were not sure how to start by musical education. When I was seven or eight years old, they took me to King’s College, Cambridge to hear Evensong and I was completely blown away by the experience. We applied to several cathedral choir schools, but I was considered too old to join and had no background in playing musical instruments. We then went to our local cathedral at Bury St. Edmunds and the organist immediately agreed to take me in. There, I joined the cathedral choir, loving every minute of it, and went on to become head chorister.
I went to a public school in Surrey and then won a music scholarship to St. John’s School, Leatherhead, where I spent five years. My voice began to change, dropping from treble range to tenor and, fortunately, during the process, there was no time when I was not able to sing.
PH: Having finished school, what were your next moves?
SH: I spent my gap year in Portsmouth, singing in the Portsmouth Cathedral Choir. Winning a choral scholarship, I went to study at St. John’s College, Cambridge, which has a distinguished tradition of religious music. I was reading Theology and Music, studying voice with David Lowe. The St. John’s College Chapel Choir sang the daily services during term time and, at other times, we toured the world, performing. This chapel choir was among the top five choirs in Cambridge. I began singing solos with the choir and with choral societies in Cambridge.
In 1998 I began a teacher training course but, two weeks into studies, decided it was not for me. I was doing an extra year in the St. John’s College Choir. Tim Brown rescued me by employing me at Clare College as his assistant. Since then, I have remained a soloist with the Clare College Choir. Through that job, I landed another – as John Rutter’s personal assistant from 1999 to 2002. (Rutter is a fellow of Clare College and Tim Brown’s predecessor.)
However, in 2002 I applied to study at the Royal College of Music, won a scholarship and took studies there with Ashley Stafford and David Maxwell Anderson. This led me into the solo world.
PH: Would you like to talk about your solo career?
SW: Yes. My main field at the moment is oratorio, often singing the role of the Evangelist. I love singing oratorio. I have sung the Evangelist in Bach Passions, performing all over England and in New York. Most recently, I performed the St. Matthew Passion in Cambridge with Tim Brown conducting the Clare College Choir. Not long ago, I sang it at the Snape Maltings (Benjamin Britten’s concert hall in Suffolk) conducted by Masaaki Suzuki.
The oddest oratorio I have sung in is a large piece by Sir John Tavener “The Veil of the Temple”, which we performed in the Temple Church in London. The work is actually an all-night vigil. I had to sing 15 minutes of unaccompanied Gospel at 5 a.m.! “The Veil of the Temple” is a multi-faith piece in eight cycles, with a Gospel at the end of each. We also performed it in New York’s Lincoln Center and we did a shortened version of it at the Proms in London’s Albert Hall.
PH: Do you sing opera?
SH: I have done some opera work. I have sung under Emmanuelle Haim in Opera de Lille and Opera du Rhin. Haim is a French conductor and harpsichordist with a particular interest in early music. I sang in her performance of Purcell’s “Faerie Queene”. Together with ten other singers, I took part in a recording she directed – “Lamentie” - a selection of mostly Monteverdi works.
PH: What do you consider the to be the high points in your career so far?
SH: One of them was soloing in the Three Choirs Festival (UK.) This takes place every August by rotation in the cathedral cities of Gloucester, Hereford and Worcester. I sang in Schumann’s oratorio “Das Paradies und die Peri”, conducted by (the late) Richard Hickocks.
I recently sang the role of the Evangelist in a recording (Naxos) with the Choir of Jesus College, Cambridge of “The Passion of Our Lord According to Saint Mark” (1920), composed by Charles Wood.
I am a founding member of “La Nuova Musica” – a fairly new ensemble in which we are trying to bring vocal drama back to early music, based on treatises written at the time, the main one being Caccini’s “Le Nuove Musiche” (1602), a word-led approach.
PH: So what is next?
SW: I will appear in the 2009 Three Choirs Festival in a piece by John McCabe (b.1939) called “Songs of the Garden”, a selection of garden- and wildlife poetry set for choir and soloists. Then countertenor Iestyn Davies and I will perform Blow’s “Ode on the Death of Henry Purcell” at a Prom concert in September together with the Academy of Ancient Music.
And, of course, there are the Bach Christmas Oratorio concerts in Israel in December 2009. I have been in Tel Aviv on vacation, but this will be my first performing tour of Israel.
PH: Simon, many thanks for your time. We look forward to welcoming you in Israel.
Friday, September 25, 2009
Elli Jaffe researches and collects Jewish music, composes and conducts
On April 26th, 2009, I had the pleasure of interviewing Elli Jaffe. Jaffe is known to many as the musical director and conductor of the choir of Jerusalem’s Great Synagogue, Heichal Shlomo, and as an orchestral conductor. He is also a composer and arranger. In 2007, Jaffe was awarded the Jerusalem Prize for his contribution to Jewish music.
Pamela: Elli, when did you begin your musical education?
Elli: I was born in Jerusalem. Like all Jewish children, I studied some recorder, a bit of piano and sang in a choir but it was only at age 19 that I decided to become a professional musician. I enrolled at the Jerusalem Academy of Music, where I had the privilege of studying with some of Israel’s leading musicians – with Mendi Rodan, Ami Ma’ayani, Mark Kopytman, Chaim Alexander, Tzvi Avni, Shabtai Petrushka and Nachum Amir. I completed my Artist’s Diploma with distinction in conducting and music theory, after which I spent a year studying at the Royal Academy of Music in London.
Pamela: How did your career develop on your return to Israel?
Elli: Back in Israel, I took master classes with Leonard Bernstein and Igor Markevich and began conducting in countries all over the world. I was offered the position of conductor of the Mexico Philharmonic Orchestra but refused it for reasons of Sabbath observance. I have, however, conducted all the major Israeli orchestras and am always interested to further young performing artists, inviting them to play with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, The Israel Chamber Orchestra and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. I usually conduct the final concert of the Young Artists’ Competition, which is under the auspices of the Israel Broadcasting Authority.
Pamela: Would you like to talk about the Jerusalem Great Synagogue Choir and your interest in education?
Elli: Yes. I conduct this men’s choir in memory of my late father, who was a driving force behind the establishment of the synagogue. My aims are to create a standard of excellence in performance but also to promote a deep understanding of the piece and the composer’s ideas, to bring out the “Neshama” (spiritual meaning) of each piece. We rehearse at least once a week and there is a homey, easy-going atmosphere in the choir. Choir members come from many walks of life: many are professional people – businessman, lawyers and doctors – as well as music-lovers and some professional musicians. One of our choir members is Adrian Isaacs, a retired synagogue choir conductor himself.
We have toured much, performing in such venues as the Mozarteum Hall in Salzburg, the Sydney Opera House and with orchestras such as the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, the Prague Symphony and the Manchester Camerata in the new hall of the Halle Orchestra.
Pamela: I do know of your interest in education.
Elli: I will mention just one of my educational projects: I established a school of cantorial music, now in Petach Tikvah, in order to produce a new generation of cantors and some of my own students are teachers there. Some of the cantorial music I have written has pedagogical content and students should analyze them as they would a Beethoven symphony.
Pamela: You also write music and about music. Would you tell us something of this side of your professional life?
Elli: Yes. I both compose and arrange Jewish music, including orchestral- and cantorial arrangements of Israeli-, oriental- and Hassidic songs. My symphony, “Kaddish”, has been performed by the IPO and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and a quintet of mine has been played by the IPO Quintet. I have written a violin concerto, “Ode to Ida”, dedicated to Ida Haendel. I am hoping she will perform it.
At the moment, I am writing a book about modes of the prayer of Ashkenaz (nusach tefillah) used throughout the year. The recording that accompanies the book – 15 discs – has already been issued.
Pamela: How do you find Israeli audiences?
Elli: I have always found Israeli audiences to be warm and appreciative and, actually, not as narrow-minded as some musicians claim. Cantorial music in symphonic dress attracts many different kinds of people. If this can break down barriers between religious and non-religious people, I would be very happy.
Pamela: What are your plans?
Elli: At the moment I am composing a work commemorating 400 years since the death of Rabbi Judah Loew, the Maharal of Prague (1525-1609), one of the most seminal thinkers in the post-medieval period. The work will be scored for large orchestra, choir and soloists.
I will be conducting in the Mahler Festival in Prague in 2010.
Pamela: How do you see the role of music in your life?
Elli: For me, music is the greatest gift after Torah. It helps me raise my level in Torah and I conduct my Torah way of life through music. It promotes communication between human beings: people play and sing different voices but they do hear each other. Music can create bridges between nations and between Jews and it does it better than politicians can. I believe music is a gift of G-d. When conducting Richard Strauss’ Alpine Symphony, I claimed it was a gesture of gratitude to the Almighty for creating those monumental mountains.
Pamela: Thank you very much for sharing your experiences and ideas with our readers. We wish you continued joy in your various musical activities.
Pamela: Elli, when did you begin your musical education?
Elli: I was born in Jerusalem. Like all Jewish children, I studied some recorder, a bit of piano and sang in a choir but it was only at age 19 that I decided to become a professional musician. I enrolled at the Jerusalem Academy of Music, where I had the privilege of studying with some of Israel’s leading musicians – with Mendi Rodan, Ami Ma’ayani, Mark Kopytman, Chaim Alexander, Tzvi Avni, Shabtai Petrushka and Nachum Amir. I completed my Artist’s Diploma with distinction in conducting and music theory, after which I spent a year studying at the Royal Academy of Music in London.
Pamela: How did your career develop on your return to Israel?
Elli: Back in Israel, I took master classes with Leonard Bernstein and Igor Markevich and began conducting in countries all over the world. I was offered the position of conductor of the Mexico Philharmonic Orchestra but refused it for reasons of Sabbath observance. I have, however, conducted all the major Israeli orchestras and am always interested to further young performing artists, inviting them to play with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, The Israel Chamber Orchestra and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. I usually conduct the final concert of the Young Artists’ Competition, which is under the auspices of the Israel Broadcasting Authority.
Pamela: Would you like to talk about the Jerusalem Great Synagogue Choir and your interest in education?
Elli: Yes. I conduct this men’s choir in memory of my late father, who was a driving force behind the establishment of the synagogue. My aims are to create a standard of excellence in performance but also to promote a deep understanding of the piece and the composer’s ideas, to bring out the “Neshama” (spiritual meaning) of each piece. We rehearse at least once a week and there is a homey, easy-going atmosphere in the choir. Choir members come from many walks of life: many are professional people – businessman, lawyers and doctors – as well as music-lovers and some professional musicians. One of our choir members is Adrian Isaacs, a retired synagogue choir conductor himself.
We have toured much, performing in such venues as the Mozarteum Hall in Salzburg, the Sydney Opera House and with orchestras such as the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, the Prague Symphony and the Manchester Camerata in the new hall of the Halle Orchestra.
Pamela: I do know of your interest in education.
Elli: I will mention just one of my educational projects: I established a school of cantorial music, now in Petach Tikvah, in order to produce a new generation of cantors and some of my own students are teachers there. Some of the cantorial music I have written has pedagogical content and students should analyze them as they would a Beethoven symphony.
Pamela: You also write music and about music. Would you tell us something of this side of your professional life?
Elli: Yes. I both compose and arrange Jewish music, including orchestral- and cantorial arrangements of Israeli-, oriental- and Hassidic songs. My symphony, “Kaddish”, has been performed by the IPO and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and a quintet of mine has been played by the IPO Quintet. I have written a violin concerto, “Ode to Ida”, dedicated to Ida Haendel. I am hoping she will perform it.
At the moment, I am writing a book about modes of the prayer of Ashkenaz (nusach tefillah) used throughout the year. The recording that accompanies the book – 15 discs – has already been issued.
Pamela: How do you find Israeli audiences?
Elli: I have always found Israeli audiences to be warm and appreciative and, actually, not as narrow-minded as some musicians claim. Cantorial music in symphonic dress attracts many different kinds of people. If this can break down barriers between religious and non-religious people, I would be very happy.
Pamela: What are your plans?
Elli: At the moment I am composing a work commemorating 400 years since the death of Rabbi Judah Loew, the Maharal of Prague (1525-1609), one of the most seminal thinkers in the post-medieval period. The work will be scored for large orchestra, choir and soloists.
I will be conducting in the Mahler Festival in Prague in 2010.
Pamela: How do you see the role of music in your life?
Elli: For me, music is the greatest gift after Torah. It helps me raise my level in Torah and I conduct my Torah way of life through music. It promotes communication between human beings: people play and sing different voices but they do hear each other. Music can create bridges between nations and between Jews and it does it better than politicians can. I believe music is a gift of G-d. When conducting Richard Strauss’ Alpine Symphony, I claimed it was a gesture of gratitude to the Almighty for creating those monumental mountains.
Pamela: Thank you very much for sharing your experiences and ideas with our readers. We wish you continued joy in your various musical activities.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Boaz Berney plays early flutes and also builds them
Jerusalem-born Boaz Berney teaches and plays Baroque- and Renaissance flutes; he also builds these flutes and Romantic flutes. On February 4 2009, I telephoned Boaz in his Jaffa studio.
Pamela: Boaz, when did you begin taking an interest in music?
Boaz: I grew up in Ra’anana and began learning the recorder at age seven. I then changed to the flute when I was eight or nine, studying with Michael Weintraub. During my compulsory army service, I attended the Early Music Workshop in Jerusalem and there I made my acquaintance with historical instruments and early performance practice, and, as a result, spent the next three or four years studying Baroque flute with Idit Shemer.
Pamela: Would you like to talk about the time you spent in Holland?
Boaz: Yes. I was in Holland for ten years. I studied traverso (Baroque flute) under Wilbert Hazelzet at the Royal Conservatory in the Hague, becoming more familiar with Renaissance music and that of other periods. It is important for players to study music written before the Baroque. But I had also set my sights on instrument-making. At the Utrecht Early Music Festival, which attracts a variety of instrument-makers, I looked for a maker with whom I could study and I became apprenticed to recorder-maker Peter van der Poel. With him I learned all the basics about how to work with wood and the art of copying historical instruments; a year later, I began working at home. From 1995 to 1998, I worked at the Gemeente Museum in the Hague, compiling a catalogue of the Baroque flutes in their collection as well as doing conservation work on woodwind instruments there. Examining so many original instruments taught me a lot about the craftsmanship of early instrument makers. I was able to compare flutes I was building with those in the museum.
During 2000 and 2001, I researched Romantic flutes, focusing on those in the Vienna workshop of Stephan Koch (fl. 1807-1828), putting them in chronological order and studying their specific timbre and characteristics.
I was also performing in two ensembles I had formed – one was a wind quintet performing Classical music on historical instruments. The other, the Modena Consort – an ensemble focusing on Renaissance polyphonic music, consisting of a singer, four flutes and two lutes – still exists and we perform in concerts and festivals in Europe; see http://www.modenaconsort.com .
Pamela: When did you return to Israel?
Boaz: I came back to Israel in 2005. Two years later, I began playing in the newly-formed Barrocade Ensemble, with which I continue to be very involved. Many of the players in the Barrocade Ensemble are people, like myself, who have spent years in Europe and have returned to Israel. I am also a member of the Discantvs Ensemble, comprising of Kimberly Reine, Genevieve Blanchard and myself on Renaissance flutes, Eitan Hoffer (lute and Baroque guitar) and countertenor Doron Schleifer. The flutes played in the group were built by me.
Much of my time is spent building flutes in my workshop in an old Ottoman-style house in the inspiring town of Jaffa. Some of my clients are Israelis but most of the orders come from overseas. I frequently travel to exhibitions of historical instruments in London, Vienna, Boston, Berlin and Utrecht, where I show my flutes and take orders from players. I buy the wood in Europe and Turkey and find it important to travel there to choose each and every piece myself. Most of these instruments are made from Boxwood. The Boxwood tree grows very slowly and its wood varies. My expertise is in building Renaissance flutes but I also like making Baroque- and Romantic flutes.
Pamela: Do you teach flute?
Boaz: Yes. I have three or four adult students studying traverso with me.
Pamela: What are your thoughts on the Israeli concert audience?
Boaz: My experience performing with Barrocade and Discantvs here is positive. Till now, there have been no consorts of Renaissance flutes in this country; this kind of ensemble is new to the Israeli concert scene. The local concert public shows an interest in new groups, is curious to hear repertoire not previously heard here and is warm and communicative.
Pamela: Boaz, it has been most interesting talking to you. Concert-goers will enjoy hearing your fine performance on early flutes in Israeli concert halls and there will be plenty of opportunities to hear you and your fellow Early Music players and singers this concert season.
Pamela: Boaz, when did you begin taking an interest in music?
Boaz: I grew up in Ra’anana and began learning the recorder at age seven. I then changed to the flute when I was eight or nine, studying with Michael Weintraub. During my compulsory army service, I attended the Early Music Workshop in Jerusalem and there I made my acquaintance with historical instruments and early performance practice, and, as a result, spent the next three or four years studying Baroque flute with Idit Shemer.
Pamela: Would you like to talk about the time you spent in Holland?
Boaz: Yes. I was in Holland for ten years. I studied traverso (Baroque flute) under Wilbert Hazelzet at the Royal Conservatory in the Hague, becoming more familiar with Renaissance music and that of other periods. It is important for players to study music written before the Baroque. But I had also set my sights on instrument-making. At the Utrecht Early Music Festival, which attracts a variety of instrument-makers, I looked for a maker with whom I could study and I became apprenticed to recorder-maker Peter van der Poel. With him I learned all the basics about how to work with wood and the art of copying historical instruments; a year later, I began working at home. From 1995 to 1998, I worked at the Gemeente Museum in the Hague, compiling a catalogue of the Baroque flutes in their collection as well as doing conservation work on woodwind instruments there. Examining so many original instruments taught me a lot about the craftsmanship of early instrument makers. I was able to compare flutes I was building with those in the museum.
During 2000 and 2001, I researched Romantic flutes, focusing on those in the Vienna workshop of Stephan Koch (fl. 1807-1828), putting them in chronological order and studying their specific timbre and characteristics.
I was also performing in two ensembles I had formed – one was a wind quintet performing Classical music on historical instruments. The other, the Modena Consort – an ensemble focusing on Renaissance polyphonic music, consisting of a singer, four flutes and two lutes – still exists and we perform in concerts and festivals in Europe; see http://www.modenaconsort.com .
Pamela: When did you return to Israel?
Boaz: I came back to Israel in 2005. Two years later, I began playing in the newly-formed Barrocade Ensemble, with which I continue to be very involved. Many of the players in the Barrocade Ensemble are people, like myself, who have spent years in Europe and have returned to Israel. I am also a member of the Discantvs Ensemble, comprising of Kimberly Reine, Genevieve Blanchard and myself on Renaissance flutes, Eitan Hoffer (lute and Baroque guitar) and countertenor Doron Schleifer. The flutes played in the group were built by me.
Much of my time is spent building flutes in my workshop in an old Ottoman-style house in the inspiring town of Jaffa. Some of my clients are Israelis but most of the orders come from overseas. I frequently travel to exhibitions of historical instruments in London, Vienna, Boston, Berlin and Utrecht, where I show my flutes and take orders from players. I buy the wood in Europe and Turkey and find it important to travel there to choose each and every piece myself. Most of these instruments are made from Boxwood. The Boxwood tree grows very slowly and its wood varies. My expertise is in building Renaissance flutes but I also like making Baroque- and Romantic flutes.
Pamela: Do you teach flute?
Boaz: Yes. I have three or four adult students studying traverso with me.
Pamela: What are your thoughts on the Israeli concert audience?
Boaz: My experience performing with Barrocade and Discantvs here is positive. Till now, there have been no consorts of Renaissance flutes in this country; this kind of ensemble is new to the Israeli concert scene. The local concert public shows an interest in new groups, is curious to hear repertoire not previously heard here and is warm and communicative.
Pamela: Boaz, it has been most interesting talking to you. Concert-goers will enjoy hearing your fine performance on early flutes in Israeli concert halls and there will be plenty of opportunities to hear you and your fellow Early Music players and singers this concert season.
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Amit Tiefenbrunn plays viol,violone and guitar and builds historical instruments
On September 21, I had the pleasure of interviewing Amit Tiefenbrunn. Born in Israel, Tiefenbrunn, an instrument-maker and eclectic musician, talked about his musical journey.
Pamela: How did you begin your musical training?
Amit: My family enjoyed music and, as children, the three of us took music lessons. My ambition was to play the guitar; however, at the Givatayim Music Conservatory, I studied the violin for some years. I wanted to change over to the saxophone, at the Conservatory they suggested I play the French horn and I ended up leaving and playing neither! To the horror of my parents, I bought an electric guitar and began playing music with friends, which was what I really wanted to be doing: we played repertoire such as Beatles songs, bossa nova and jazz. We performed in pubs and cafes in Tel Aviv and also at weddings. I was interested to play jazz on double bass and, at age 20, when still busy with my compulsory army service, I approached Eli Magen – a double bass player in the IPO and jazz musician – with the idea of studying double bass jazz technique with him. Magen insisted on first giving me a proper grounding in the instrument, and worked with me on techniques of bowing, positions etc. He also instilled in me the importance of having an organized practice schedule and of accurate playing and I began practising the double bass for six to eight hours a day.
The truth is that I had no intention of becoming a professional musician and studied to become a mechanic, graduating with a teaching certificate in technical subjects.
Pamela: So what happened to change your mind?
Amit: At age 21, I landed the job of double bass player with the Haifa Symphony Orchestra, then moving on to the Beer Sheba Sinfonietta. But I was still searching for my real niche in the musical world. Orchestral playing with a conductor at the helm was not what I wanted. I had a great love of Baroque music, which I see as the combination of classical- and light music. There is no Baroque music without swing!! I wanted to get back to playing in small groups again, with all players working together on interpretation.
My love of Baroque music led me to the idea of learning the viol. There were no viol players or teachers here in Israel and in 1991 I went to Holland to immerse myself in the art of Baroque music. I studied the viola da gamba for seven years with Anneke Pols at the Utrecht Conservatory of Music and the violone (a bass viol) for two years with Margaret Urquhart at the Hague Royal Conservatory. I played both instruments in ensembles, performing in Holland and other European countries and recording discs.
Through my harpsichord teacher I met Dirk Jacob Hamoen, who builds double basses and violins, and he took me on as a student. For four years, I spent three days a week in his workshop learning the art of instrument-making. This combined my love of music with my mechanical skills.
Pamela: When did you return to Israel?
Amit: I returned to Israel end of 2000 to open my own of instrument-making workshop and I had a list of orders. As a family man, I chose not to travel overseas too much to perform and, by 2002, I found myself involved in a lot of performing with the Jerusalem Baroque Orchestra, the Arcadia Ensemble, PHOENIX, Spirito Barocco and Ensemble Nobile. The latter is made up of soprano Ye’ela Avital, violinist Shlomit Sivan, harpsichord player Yizhar Karshon and myself; we were in the USA on a performing tour this last April. This quartet also forms the basis of the Barrocade Ensemble, the Israeli Baroque Collective. We have just returned from taking part in the VBE Festival, “Baroque Evenings” in Varazdin, Croatia where Nobile performed three concerts which included Jewish and Israeli content, and Barrocade took part in the final concert. In a partly destroyed synagogue in Varazdin, a venue that seemed inadequate for any performance, we performed one of our best concerts, finishing it off with a Klesmer piece. I think the audience was as moved as we were; it was, indeed, symbolic for us to bring this Jewish venue back to life. As it happened, this concert was considered one of the two best events of the festival!
Pamela: The Barrocade Ensemble appears to be a different concept to most ensembles.
Amit. Without any doubt! We have no conductor, no permanent musical director. We feel that all musicians have strengths, the ability to teach, ideas and dreams. As a collective, all jobs are shared among the players – musical direction, administration, publicity…even graphics. Discussion of interpretation (this does not exclude arguing!) is open to all, placing a lot of responsibility on the part of each musician, meaning 14 or 15 rehearsals before each concert and the need to “leave one’s ego at home”. This is a process each of us in the ensemble has had to learn and internalize; it is not easy for performers to offer each other constructive criticism and even more difficult to accept it and see it as objective and positive. This approach does not suit all musicians. For me, the aspect of making music together is of prime importance: it involves the interaction of human dynamics, with musicians being objective about how we perform, seeing performance as work in process and not as one set interpretation. Barrocade is about to open its second concert season and has recently released its first CD – “Vivaldolino”.
Pamela: How would you describe the Israeli concert audience? And how do you see the Israeli music scene?
Amit: The audience plays such an important part in concerts. Israeli audiences react quickly…within minutes of our beginning to play. Peoples’ facial expressions are a yardstick for us. In fact, audience reaction has been an important factor as to how we now build our repertoire.
There is a lot of good professional music in Israel but, in my opinion, not enough amateur groups. Making music contributes so much to personal enrichment: it promotes communication between people; I would go so far to say that it is therapeutic. Music brings people together.
Pamela: Do you teach?
Amit: Yes. I love teaching…it is a calling. My pupils at the Jerusalem Academy of Music are people with their eye on a performing career. I would like to mention my pupils Alexandra Polin, who plays both ‘cello, and viol, and Alon Portal, both of whom are now members of Barrocade. Then there is the very gifted 12-year-old, Sonia Navot, who has recently won the America-Israel Cultural Foundation prize for performance.
Pamela: What are your plans?
Amit: I want to continue playing, working with people, striving for excellence. I plan to put my energies into working with the Barrocade Ensemble and with other smaller groups. Music for me is not a “job”; it is a way of life. And I continue to build instruments – viols, Baroque violins, medieval bowed instruments and harps. My instruments are shown in the Utrecht Early Music Festival every year, a meeting in which more than eighty instrument-makers from all over the world take part.
Pamela: Thank you for your time and for sharing your interesting ideas.
Pamela: How did you begin your musical training?
Amit: My family enjoyed music and, as children, the three of us took music lessons. My ambition was to play the guitar; however, at the Givatayim Music Conservatory, I studied the violin for some years. I wanted to change over to the saxophone, at the Conservatory they suggested I play the French horn and I ended up leaving and playing neither! To the horror of my parents, I bought an electric guitar and began playing music with friends, which was what I really wanted to be doing: we played repertoire such as Beatles songs, bossa nova and jazz. We performed in pubs and cafes in Tel Aviv and also at weddings. I was interested to play jazz on double bass and, at age 20, when still busy with my compulsory army service, I approached Eli Magen – a double bass player in the IPO and jazz musician – with the idea of studying double bass jazz technique with him. Magen insisted on first giving me a proper grounding in the instrument, and worked with me on techniques of bowing, positions etc. He also instilled in me the importance of having an organized practice schedule and of accurate playing and I began practising the double bass for six to eight hours a day.
The truth is that I had no intention of becoming a professional musician and studied to become a mechanic, graduating with a teaching certificate in technical subjects.
Pamela: So what happened to change your mind?
Amit: At age 21, I landed the job of double bass player with the Haifa Symphony Orchestra, then moving on to the Beer Sheba Sinfonietta. But I was still searching for my real niche in the musical world. Orchestral playing with a conductor at the helm was not what I wanted. I had a great love of Baroque music, which I see as the combination of classical- and light music. There is no Baroque music without swing!! I wanted to get back to playing in small groups again, with all players working together on interpretation.
My love of Baroque music led me to the idea of learning the viol. There were no viol players or teachers here in Israel and in 1991 I went to Holland to immerse myself in the art of Baroque music. I studied the viola da gamba for seven years with Anneke Pols at the Utrecht Conservatory of Music and the violone (a bass viol) for two years with Margaret Urquhart at the Hague Royal Conservatory. I played both instruments in ensembles, performing in Holland and other European countries and recording discs.
Through my harpsichord teacher I met Dirk Jacob Hamoen, who builds double basses and violins, and he took me on as a student. For four years, I spent three days a week in his workshop learning the art of instrument-making. This combined my love of music with my mechanical skills.
Pamela: When did you return to Israel?
Amit: I returned to Israel end of 2000 to open my own of instrument-making workshop and I had a list of orders. As a family man, I chose not to travel overseas too much to perform and, by 2002, I found myself involved in a lot of performing with the Jerusalem Baroque Orchestra, the Arcadia Ensemble, PHOENIX, Spirito Barocco and Ensemble Nobile. The latter is made up of soprano Ye’ela Avital, violinist Shlomit Sivan, harpsichord player Yizhar Karshon and myself; we were in the USA on a performing tour this last April. This quartet also forms the basis of the Barrocade Ensemble, the Israeli Baroque Collective. We have just returned from taking part in the VBE Festival, “Baroque Evenings” in Varazdin, Croatia where Nobile performed three concerts which included Jewish and Israeli content, and Barrocade took part in the final concert. In a partly destroyed synagogue in Varazdin, a venue that seemed inadequate for any performance, we performed one of our best concerts, finishing it off with a Klesmer piece. I think the audience was as moved as we were; it was, indeed, symbolic for us to bring this Jewish venue back to life. As it happened, this concert was considered one of the two best events of the festival!
Pamela: The Barrocade Ensemble appears to be a different concept to most ensembles.
Amit. Without any doubt! We have no conductor, no permanent musical director. We feel that all musicians have strengths, the ability to teach, ideas and dreams. As a collective, all jobs are shared among the players – musical direction, administration, publicity…even graphics. Discussion of interpretation (this does not exclude arguing!) is open to all, placing a lot of responsibility on the part of each musician, meaning 14 or 15 rehearsals before each concert and the need to “leave one’s ego at home”. This is a process each of us in the ensemble has had to learn and internalize; it is not easy for performers to offer each other constructive criticism and even more difficult to accept it and see it as objective and positive. This approach does not suit all musicians. For me, the aspect of making music together is of prime importance: it involves the interaction of human dynamics, with musicians being objective about how we perform, seeing performance as work in process and not as one set interpretation. Barrocade is about to open its second concert season and has recently released its first CD – “Vivaldolino”.
Pamela: How would you describe the Israeli concert audience? And how do you see the Israeli music scene?
Amit: The audience plays such an important part in concerts. Israeli audiences react quickly…within minutes of our beginning to play. Peoples’ facial expressions are a yardstick for us. In fact, audience reaction has been an important factor as to how we now build our repertoire.
There is a lot of good professional music in Israel but, in my opinion, not enough amateur groups. Making music contributes so much to personal enrichment: it promotes communication between people; I would go so far to say that it is therapeutic. Music brings people together.
Pamela: Do you teach?
Amit: Yes. I love teaching…it is a calling. My pupils at the Jerusalem Academy of Music are people with their eye on a performing career. I would like to mention my pupils Alexandra Polin, who plays both ‘cello, and viol, and Alon Portal, both of whom are now members of Barrocade. Then there is the very gifted 12-year-old, Sonia Navot, who has recently won the America-Israel Cultural Foundation prize for performance.
Pamela: What are your plans?
Amit: I want to continue playing, working with people, striving for excellence. I plan to put my energies into working with the Barrocade Ensemble and with other smaller groups. Music for me is not a “job”; it is a way of life. And I continue to build instruments – viols, Baroque violins, medieval bowed instruments and harps. My instruments are shown in the Utrecht Early Music Festival every year, a meeting in which more than eighty instrument-makers from all over the world take part.
Pamela: Thank you for your time and for sharing your interesting ideas.
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Ze'ev Steinberg - violist and composer
In November 2008, I had the privilege of interviewing violist, teacher, composer and arranger Ze’ev Steinberg in honor of his 90th birthday.
Pamela: Ze’ev Steinberg, can you tell us about your childhood and early musical training?
Ze’ev Steinberg: I was born in Germany in 1918 and spent the first fifteen years of my life in the city of Trier on the Mosel River, a small historic city with a long history of culture, beginning with Constantine the Great. Trier was also the birthplace of Karl Marx. My parents were both physicians but my father was also a graduate of the Cologne Hochschule fuer Musik, where he had studied violin. At the age of five, I also wanted to learn the violin and my father agreed to this on condition that I join the choir school at the Cathedral of St Peter in Trier. I am grateful to my father for this: there I studied sight-singing and sang choral works from Medieval- and Renaissance music to later periods and I loved it! However, when Hitler came to power, my parents, being Zionists, felt I should leave Germany, and so I joined the first group of Youth Aliyah and left for Palestine.
Pamela: How and where did you spend your first years in Israel?
Z.S: In 1934, I was sent to Kibbutz Ein Harod as an agricultural worker for two years, moved to Kibbutz Beit Hashita, where I met my first wife, and then to Be’er Tuvia.. We then moved to Tel Aviv, where I became an inter-urban taxi driver with the Aviv Taxi Company. At that time I joined the Tel Aviv Physicians’ Orchestra, conducted by Otto Selbach. We performed one or two concerts a year. Selbach was also the conductor of the Palestine Orchestra, the orchestra which was to eventually become the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. As a driver, I did some extra work – driving members of the Palestine Orchestra to various locations to perform; this gave me the opportunity to hear a lot of chamber music.
I went to study violin with Lorand Fenyves and with Oeden Partos. Partos later founded the Tel Aviv Academy of Music where he also taught chamber music. One day, Partos told me he was in need of a viola player; I saw this as an opportunity to study further and ended up taking part in his viola- and chamber music classes. Partos became my mentor and friend.
P.H.: You were known to many of us as a member of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. When did your many years as violist in the IPO begin?
Z.S.: In 1942, the IPO lost some of its string players to cafes and places offering light musical entertainment. Partos suggested I audition as violist and I landed the job as substitute violist in the orchestra. A year later I took another audition and was accepted as a member of the IPO. In 1969 I received the job of assistant principal violist and I feel I was a good leader. I have traveled the world with the IPO, officially playing in it till 1984 and, then, for another extra ten years.
I have also made many solo appearances with all major Israeli orchestras – with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, The Israel Sinfonietta Beersheba, the Israel Chamber Orchestra, the IPO, the Kibbutz Orchestra and the Ramat Gan Orchestra.
P.H.: Let’s go back to your interest in chamber music and teaching.
Z.S.: In the 1942-3 season I started a professional string quartet with another three players, and founded another quartet in 1949 - the Tel Aviv String Quartet. In 1959, I joined the Israel Quartet, in which I played till 1993. We were organized in such a way that our programs would not clash with those of the Tel Aviv String Quartet, which was led by Chaim Taub.
In 1953, Partos, then head of the Tel Aviv Academy of Music, asked me to take the position of senior lecturer there teaching viola and chamber music. I accepted and was busy with that till around 1985. After that, from 1986 to 1987, I taught chamber music at the Jerusalem Academy of Music. Till today, young colleagues come to me for tutoring, preparation for auditions, etc.
I have also engaged in chamber music activities promoting contemporary music – Israeli and otherwise. Evelyn de Rothschild provided the financing for the “Musical Evenings” series, directed by Gary Bertini. In these concerts, which took place at the Tel Aviv Museum, we performed music of Schoenberg, Hindemith, Copland and other composers in ensembles of various numbers of players. I loved this repertoire and performing in these concerts.
In around 1986, I was one of the co-founders of Musica Nova, an organization of leading musicians, most of them from the IPO and the Israel Chamber Orchestra, whose aim was to perform very contemporary music. Working with local and overseas conductors, we performed five to seven concerts of 20th century music per year, at least half of each concert being made up of works by Israeli composers. Works of mine were also performed by Musica Nova; for example, “Seven for Eleven” – seven pieces for eleven players. Ten years ago, we traveled to Houston to take part in a festival of contemporary Jewish music. The ensemble still exists and I continue to sit on its committee, but no longer play in it.
P.H.: Well, on the subject of your own works, would you like to elaborate?
Z.S.: Yes. I have composed string quartets, a few songs, but, mostly chamber music. As a leading member of the Ramat Gan Orchestra since the 1980’s, I have written a number of arrangements for strings to be played by this orchestra; for example, Mendelssohn’s “Songs Without Words”, Bach’s “Art of Fugue” and Schubert’s “Arpeggione” Sonata. The latter arrangement has been performed all over the world, most recently in Germany. I still write arrangements.
My biblical cantata, “Rahab and the Spies” (1969), scored for contralto, two recorder players, ‘cello, harpsichord, light percussion and narrator, using texts from the Book of Joshua, won me the Avraham Kartch Prize for Jewish Music. It was and continues to be a successful work.
P.H.: With what activities are you busy at the moment?
Z.S.: I continue to play with the Ramat Gan Orchestra, where I am musical adviser to the conductor. I also play in the Emeritus Orchestra, an orchestra conducted by Sam Zebba. Members are retired players from the IPO, the JSO and the Israel Sinfonietta Be’er Sheva, some fine amateur players as well as a few young musicians looking to get experience in orchestral playing. We all play in this orchestra for the fun of it, but do give some concerts; not long ago, we traveled to Cyprus to perform.
I would like to mention one more of my musical interests: for some 30 years, I have been a member of both executive- and musical committees of the International Harp Contest, a competition that takes place in Tel Aviv every three years. In October 2009, the contest will celebrate its 50th anniversary and I will have the honor of being one of the judges. I do enjoy my involvement in this prestigious competition.
P.H.: Ze’ev Steinberg, thank you for sharing the many inspiring facets of your musical life with us. We wish you much joy and good health on the occasion of your 90th birthday.
Pamela: Ze’ev Steinberg, can you tell us about your childhood and early musical training?
Ze’ev Steinberg: I was born in Germany in 1918 and spent the first fifteen years of my life in the city of Trier on the Mosel River, a small historic city with a long history of culture, beginning with Constantine the Great. Trier was also the birthplace of Karl Marx. My parents were both physicians but my father was also a graduate of the Cologne Hochschule fuer Musik, where he had studied violin. At the age of five, I also wanted to learn the violin and my father agreed to this on condition that I join the choir school at the Cathedral of St Peter in Trier. I am grateful to my father for this: there I studied sight-singing and sang choral works from Medieval- and Renaissance music to later periods and I loved it! However, when Hitler came to power, my parents, being Zionists, felt I should leave Germany, and so I joined the first group of Youth Aliyah and left for Palestine.
Pamela: How and where did you spend your first years in Israel?
Z.S: In 1934, I was sent to Kibbutz Ein Harod as an agricultural worker for two years, moved to Kibbutz Beit Hashita, where I met my first wife, and then to Be’er Tuvia.. We then moved to Tel Aviv, where I became an inter-urban taxi driver with the Aviv Taxi Company. At that time I joined the Tel Aviv Physicians’ Orchestra, conducted by Otto Selbach. We performed one or two concerts a year. Selbach was also the conductor of the Palestine Orchestra, the orchestra which was to eventually become the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. As a driver, I did some extra work – driving members of the Palestine Orchestra to various locations to perform; this gave me the opportunity to hear a lot of chamber music.
I went to study violin with Lorand Fenyves and with Oeden Partos. Partos later founded the Tel Aviv Academy of Music where he also taught chamber music. One day, Partos told me he was in need of a viola player; I saw this as an opportunity to study further and ended up taking part in his viola- and chamber music classes. Partos became my mentor and friend.
P.H.: You were known to many of us as a member of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. When did your many years as violist in the IPO begin?
Z.S.: In 1942, the IPO lost some of its string players to cafes and places offering light musical entertainment. Partos suggested I audition as violist and I landed the job as substitute violist in the orchestra. A year later I took another audition and was accepted as a member of the IPO. In 1969 I received the job of assistant principal violist and I feel I was a good leader. I have traveled the world with the IPO, officially playing in it till 1984 and, then, for another extra ten years.
I have also made many solo appearances with all major Israeli orchestras – with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, The Israel Sinfonietta Beersheba, the Israel Chamber Orchestra, the IPO, the Kibbutz Orchestra and the Ramat Gan Orchestra.
P.H.: Let’s go back to your interest in chamber music and teaching.
Z.S.: In the 1942-3 season I started a professional string quartet with another three players, and founded another quartet in 1949 - the Tel Aviv String Quartet. In 1959, I joined the Israel Quartet, in which I played till 1993. We were organized in such a way that our programs would not clash with those of the Tel Aviv String Quartet, which was led by Chaim Taub.
In 1953, Partos, then head of the Tel Aviv Academy of Music, asked me to take the position of senior lecturer there teaching viola and chamber music. I accepted and was busy with that till around 1985. After that, from 1986 to 1987, I taught chamber music at the Jerusalem Academy of Music. Till today, young colleagues come to me for tutoring, preparation for auditions, etc.
I have also engaged in chamber music activities promoting contemporary music – Israeli and otherwise. Evelyn de Rothschild provided the financing for the “Musical Evenings” series, directed by Gary Bertini. In these concerts, which took place at the Tel Aviv Museum, we performed music of Schoenberg, Hindemith, Copland and other composers in ensembles of various numbers of players. I loved this repertoire and performing in these concerts.
In around 1986, I was one of the co-founders of Musica Nova, an organization of leading musicians, most of them from the IPO and the Israel Chamber Orchestra, whose aim was to perform very contemporary music. Working with local and overseas conductors, we performed five to seven concerts of 20th century music per year, at least half of each concert being made up of works by Israeli composers. Works of mine were also performed by Musica Nova; for example, “Seven for Eleven” – seven pieces for eleven players. Ten years ago, we traveled to Houston to take part in a festival of contemporary Jewish music. The ensemble still exists and I continue to sit on its committee, but no longer play in it.
P.H.: Well, on the subject of your own works, would you like to elaborate?
Z.S.: Yes. I have composed string quartets, a few songs, but, mostly chamber music. As a leading member of the Ramat Gan Orchestra since the 1980’s, I have written a number of arrangements for strings to be played by this orchestra; for example, Mendelssohn’s “Songs Without Words”, Bach’s “Art of Fugue” and Schubert’s “Arpeggione” Sonata. The latter arrangement has been performed all over the world, most recently in Germany. I still write arrangements.
My biblical cantata, “Rahab and the Spies” (1969), scored for contralto, two recorder players, ‘cello, harpsichord, light percussion and narrator, using texts from the Book of Joshua, won me the Avraham Kartch Prize for Jewish Music. It was and continues to be a successful work.
P.H.: With what activities are you busy at the moment?
Z.S.: I continue to play with the Ramat Gan Orchestra, where I am musical adviser to the conductor. I also play in the Emeritus Orchestra, an orchestra conducted by Sam Zebba. Members are retired players from the IPO, the JSO and the Israel Sinfonietta Be’er Sheva, some fine amateur players as well as a few young musicians looking to get experience in orchestral playing. We all play in this orchestra for the fun of it, but do give some concerts; not long ago, we traveled to Cyprus to perform.
I would like to mention one more of my musical interests: for some 30 years, I have been a member of both executive- and musical committees of the International Harp Contest, a competition that takes place in Tel Aviv every three years. In October 2009, the contest will celebrate its 50th anniversary and I will have the honor of being one of the judges. I do enjoy my involvement in this prestigious competition.
P.H.: Ze’ev Steinberg, thank you for sharing the many inspiring facets of your musical life with us. We wish you much joy and good health on the occasion of your 90th birthday.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Eldad Lidor - composer, soundtrack designer
Israeli-born Eldad Lidor is a prolific composer and sound-track designer in high demand. He has created over 1000 compositions for theatre, films and television in Israel and overseas, infusing eclectic elements from ethnic music, jazz and other styles into his works. The recipient of several awards, he has also worked in Europe. I had the pleasure of interviewing Eldad on May 17th, 2009.
Pamela: When did you begin studying music?
Eldad: As a child I played the recorder and the accordion. Then, as a teenager, I took up the guitar, dabbling in rock-and-roll and accompanying myself in French chansons translated into Hebrew, a genre that had became popular in Israel in the late 1950’s. Apart from going to the occasional concert with my mother, I did not have much experience with classical music at that stage of my life.
Pamela: When did you begin to compose?
Eldad: At age16 or 17, I started to compose, mostly setting to music poetry by Yehuda Amichai and Natan Zach. I have always really loved Yehuda Amichai’s poetry but more about that later.
My family spent time in Paris and there I went to study electronics in order to be an electronics technician to see me through my army service. While serving in the IDF as an officer, I began to realize that what I really wanted to study was music, and began taking lessons in music theory and piano. My army service was extended due to the Yom Kippur War but in 1974, I was accepted to the Jerusalem Academy of Music to study composition and electronic music under Professor Tzvi Avni. As a music student, I supported myself by working in Kol Israel, the Israeli radio, as a technician.
Pamela: What did you decide to do on completing your music degree?
Eldad: Actually, I went back to Paris in order to study “Musique concrete”, a form of electro-acoustic music that utilizes recorded “non-musical” sound as compositional material, an aesthetic developed by Pierre Schaeffer from the late1940’s. It did not make a lot of sense to me and I returned to Israel a year later and took a job in Israeli radio in Tel Aviv, but, this time, in the sound effects room. That was where I really started to work with music in the drama milieu and learned much about studio sound. I worked with some of Israel’s best stage directors and we had unlimited time to produce work that was of a high artistic- and professional level. At that time – end of the 1970’s – the radio was an important artistic medium here, offering a variety of radio plays that featured Israel’s best actors and actresses. I would say it was an important “laboratory” experience for me and it was there that I met many of the people with whom I still work today. One important radio production was “The Queen of Sheba’s Visit”, compiled from poems by Yehuda Amichai.
Pamela: Eldad, would you like to talk about your own independent work?
Eldad: Yes. One of my early projects was “Shira’s Suiters”, a musical production of classical-style arrangements of poems and theatre pieces. Amichai, who claimed I was the best interpreter of his works, would take part in some of the performances, most of which were in kibbutzim.
An important production in 1989 was “Shakuf” (Transparent), a work Albert Amar and I wrote and arranged together, on the subject of Amar’s personal fight with drug addiction. That was the only time I actually took part on stage in my own work. We ran some 200 performances of “Shakuf”, it was one of the events in the Israel Festival and the various songs from it have become popular.
In 1986, I opened Q-Sound, my own studio; by the time I left Kol Israel in 1990, I was devoting my time to producing music for theatre, feature films, advertisements and animated films. Gil Zimmerman edits and mixes the sound. In animated films, an expertise of ours, we design all the sound and the music. Today I work with a MacIntosh computer, using a “Logic” program which has revolutionized our work: all sound and information is stored in it and is produced from it! I do, however, still work with players, most of whom have been with me for many years. I give them a musical idea and they use it in what might be called a “jam session”. Arranging it is what you might then call a jam session between the computer and myself!
Pamela: Can you mention some of your many successful theatre projects?
Eldad: Yes. I have produced work for all Israel’s major theatre companies – Beit Lessin, Habima and the Cameri Theatre, to name a few. With stage director Gadi Roll, I have worked on theatre projects in London and Poland. Some of my biggest successes are Shmuel Asfari’s “Wife, Husband, Home” and Tennessee Williams’ “The Glass Menagerie”, both Cameri productions and Ionesco’s “The Chairs”, and Arthur Miller’s “A View From the Bridge”, both Habima productions.
Pamela: You are the recipient of several prizes.
Eldad: Yes. I won the Margalit Prize for the music and sound design I created for Manuel Puig’s “The Kiss of the Spiderwoman”, staged by Itzik Weingarten and an Acco Festival award for the music for “Tonight We Dance”, a play about the life of a café. I produced and played the music for the Zik Theatre’s unconventional production “Charakruk”; we all received an Acco Festival prize for that job.
Pamela: And your other activities?
Eldad: Actually, I have branched out into two new fields. The first is education. I began teaching at Tel Aviv University and now teach students of stage production at the Kibbutz Seminary about music for theatre. We perform exercises in class with texts and music to get the students to react emotionally to the written word. Music is feeling. I also see them through their personal assignments in the subject and teach them how to work with musicians.
Another different, new field is designing sound for museums – for video, films and for the museum “space”. My most recent project of that kind was for the Rabin Museum. I have also designed for the Holon Children’s Museum and the “Harishonim” Museum in Zichron Ya’acov. I am presently busy with a sound-and light project for the Herodian Quarter in Jerusalem’s Old City.
Pamela: Tell us about your discs.
Eldad: I have put out three discs. The first two focus on pieces from my work with theatre. In my latest, “Closer”, all the pieces on it are instrumental and were composed specifically for the disc. It is an inner journey, also a journey of landscapes – I love nature.
Pamela: What are your future plans?
Eldad: To put together a stage production of my works and to be its stage producer. To travel….and to go to the sea for some early morning fishing!
Pamela: How do you see and connect to the medium in which you create?
Eldad: Music is like a drawing. I often think in terms of sound color rather than melodic lines. It is a story. My time in France has added a Parisian flavor to some of my pieces. I do not try to surprise myself; I work directly through my emotions, with no thought as to whether the result is good or not. I search for the right feeling. I have a need to be out in nature as well as a need for city life. Finally, I am much assisted by my wife, Shoshi, whose vocals are heard in my works.
Pamela: When did you begin studying music?
Eldad: As a child I played the recorder and the accordion. Then, as a teenager, I took up the guitar, dabbling in rock-and-roll and accompanying myself in French chansons translated into Hebrew, a genre that had became popular in Israel in the late 1950’s. Apart from going to the occasional concert with my mother, I did not have much experience with classical music at that stage of my life.
Pamela: When did you begin to compose?
Eldad: At age16 or 17, I started to compose, mostly setting to music poetry by Yehuda Amichai and Natan Zach. I have always really loved Yehuda Amichai’s poetry but more about that later.
My family spent time in Paris and there I went to study electronics in order to be an electronics technician to see me through my army service. While serving in the IDF as an officer, I began to realize that what I really wanted to study was music, and began taking lessons in music theory and piano. My army service was extended due to the Yom Kippur War but in 1974, I was accepted to the Jerusalem Academy of Music to study composition and electronic music under Professor Tzvi Avni. As a music student, I supported myself by working in Kol Israel, the Israeli radio, as a technician.
Pamela: What did you decide to do on completing your music degree?
Eldad: Actually, I went back to Paris in order to study “Musique concrete”, a form of electro-acoustic music that utilizes recorded “non-musical” sound as compositional material, an aesthetic developed by Pierre Schaeffer from the late1940’s. It did not make a lot of sense to me and I returned to Israel a year later and took a job in Israeli radio in Tel Aviv, but, this time, in the sound effects room. That was where I really started to work with music in the drama milieu and learned much about studio sound. I worked with some of Israel’s best stage directors and we had unlimited time to produce work that was of a high artistic- and professional level. At that time – end of the 1970’s – the radio was an important artistic medium here, offering a variety of radio plays that featured Israel’s best actors and actresses. I would say it was an important “laboratory” experience for me and it was there that I met many of the people with whom I still work today. One important radio production was “The Queen of Sheba’s Visit”, compiled from poems by Yehuda Amichai.
Pamela: Eldad, would you like to talk about your own independent work?
Eldad: Yes. One of my early projects was “Shira’s Suiters”, a musical production of classical-style arrangements of poems and theatre pieces. Amichai, who claimed I was the best interpreter of his works, would take part in some of the performances, most of which were in kibbutzim.
An important production in 1989 was “Shakuf” (Transparent), a work Albert Amar and I wrote and arranged together, on the subject of Amar’s personal fight with drug addiction. That was the only time I actually took part on stage in my own work. We ran some 200 performances of “Shakuf”, it was one of the events in the Israel Festival and the various songs from it have become popular.
In 1986, I opened Q-Sound, my own studio; by the time I left Kol Israel in 1990, I was devoting my time to producing music for theatre, feature films, advertisements and animated films. Gil Zimmerman edits and mixes the sound. In animated films, an expertise of ours, we design all the sound and the music. Today I work with a MacIntosh computer, using a “Logic” program which has revolutionized our work: all sound and information is stored in it and is produced from it! I do, however, still work with players, most of whom have been with me for many years. I give them a musical idea and they use it in what might be called a “jam session”. Arranging it is what you might then call a jam session between the computer and myself!
Pamela: Can you mention some of your many successful theatre projects?
Eldad: Yes. I have produced work for all Israel’s major theatre companies – Beit Lessin, Habima and the Cameri Theatre, to name a few. With stage director Gadi Roll, I have worked on theatre projects in London and Poland. Some of my biggest successes are Shmuel Asfari’s “Wife, Husband, Home” and Tennessee Williams’ “The Glass Menagerie”, both Cameri productions and Ionesco’s “The Chairs”, and Arthur Miller’s “A View From the Bridge”, both Habima productions.
Pamela: You are the recipient of several prizes.
Eldad: Yes. I won the Margalit Prize for the music and sound design I created for Manuel Puig’s “The Kiss of the Spiderwoman”, staged by Itzik Weingarten and an Acco Festival award for the music for “Tonight We Dance”, a play about the life of a café. I produced and played the music for the Zik Theatre’s unconventional production “Charakruk”; we all received an Acco Festival prize for that job.
Pamela: And your other activities?
Eldad: Actually, I have branched out into two new fields. The first is education. I began teaching at Tel Aviv University and now teach students of stage production at the Kibbutz Seminary about music for theatre. We perform exercises in class with texts and music to get the students to react emotionally to the written word. Music is feeling. I also see them through their personal assignments in the subject and teach them how to work with musicians.
Another different, new field is designing sound for museums – for video, films and for the museum “space”. My most recent project of that kind was for the Rabin Museum. I have also designed for the Holon Children’s Museum and the “Harishonim” Museum in Zichron Ya’acov. I am presently busy with a sound-and light project for the Herodian Quarter in Jerusalem’s Old City.
Pamela: Tell us about your discs.
Eldad: I have put out three discs. The first two focus on pieces from my work with theatre. In my latest, “Closer”, all the pieces on it are instrumental and were composed specifically for the disc. It is an inner journey, also a journey of landscapes – I love nature.
Pamela: What are your future plans?
Eldad: To put together a stage production of my works and to be its stage producer. To travel….and to go to the sea for some early morning fishing!
Pamela: How do you see and connect to the medium in which you create?
Eldad: Music is like a drawing. I often think in terms of sound color rather than melodic lines. It is a story. My time in France has added a Parisian flavor to some of my pieces. I do not try to surprise myself; I work directly through my emotions, with no thought as to whether the result is good or not. I search for the right feeling. I have a need to be out in nature as well as a need for city life. Finally, I am much assisted by my wife, Shoshi, whose vocals are heard in my works.
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